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All the news, views, and filtered excellence fit to consume during your morning grumpy.

Good morning, Jesus! Show us how you do it.

1. Yesterday, the Senate Banking Committee embarrassed itself in a hearing with JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon. The tenor of the questions were akin to a tween girl interviewing Justin Bieber, in short, it was a disturbing spectacle. Ostensibly, Mr. Dimon was brought in for a hearing over more than $2 billion in bank losses caused by risky hedge investments made by the bank that simply that blew up. It was the kind of behavior that led to the 2008 bank bailout that nearly sent the global economy into depression. Surely, the Senate would have some tough questions for Mr. Dimon and ask some tough questions about the continued behavior of his bank and their tendency to skirt regulations. Nope.

The long-shot big hope for Wall Street reformers Wednesday was that JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon would trip up before the Senate Banking Committee and expose the need for tighter rules governing big banks. His firm, after all, recently lost billions making risky bets with depositor funds on the line.

Instead, with some notable exceptions, the senators themselves turned the cross-examination into a coronation, and exposed the extent to which elected officials still feel compelled to genuflect to powerful financial interests.

“You’re obviously renowned, rightfully so I think, as being one of the most, you know, one of the best CEOs in the country for financial institutions,” crooned Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN). “You missed this, it’s a blip on the radar screen.”

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) — a tea party hero — gave Dimon a full pardon. “I really appreciate you voluntarily coming in to talk with us,” he said. “It is important that we talk about things happening in the industry. It helps us as we look forward and, hopefully, it will contribute to best practice scenarios in industry. I appreciate your emphasis on continuous quality improvement. We can hardly sit in judgment of your losing $2 billion. We lose twice that every day in Washington.”

Through campaign contributions and well-connected staff, JP Morgan appears to have already taken its own accounting of the Banking committee. Here’s a picture of connections between the company and the committee:

One current staffer on the Senate banking committee, Dwight Fettig, is a former lobbyist for JP Morgan. In 2009, the bank hired him to work on “financial services regulatory reform.” Meanwhile, JP Morgan is stacked thick with former committee staff.

JP Morgan is the second largest campaign contributor to Johnson, the committee chair, and to the top Republican on the committee, Richard Shelby of Alabama, over the past twenty years, according to a tally from American Banker.

Dimon even offered to get an apartment in D.C. so he can help the committee go through regulations in detail.

Billionaire Sheldon Adelson made a $10 million contribution to Restore Our Future, an independent group running ads that support Romney’s campaign, according to two people with knowledge of the situation. They spoke on condition of anonymity Wednesday because they were not authorized to discuss Adelson’s plans publicly.

Restore Our Future is staffed by former Romney advisers. The group has spent at least $46 million on ads backing the former Massachusetts governor during the Republican primary and since he emerged as Obama’s presumptive challenger.

So far, the vast majority of independent groups have supported Republican candidates. Priorities USA Action, formed by former Obama White House staffers to promote Obama’s re-election effort, has struggled to raise money and keep pace with its GOP-leaning counterparts.

The very idea that these SuperPACs are independent of the campaigns is an insult to our collective intelligence.

4. The Wall Street banks have chosen their horse in the Presidential race, Mitt Romney.

Now, thanks to campaign finance filings, it’s possible to put a price tag on just how much: Mitt Romney‘s presidential campaign and the super PAC supporting it are outraising Obama among financial-sector donors $37.1 million to $4.8 million.

This is a class warfare election, it’s time for Obama to get on the offensive and fully embrace it. Perhaps he has burned too many bridges with the progressive base to really capitalize on it.

The Federal Reservereleased new numbers on Monday. Unsurprisingly, wealth distribution is even more skewed than income distribution. In 2010, the median family had assets (including their house but subtracting their mortgage) of $77,300. The top 10 percent had almost $1.2 million, or more than 15 times as much.

4 Responses to “The Morning Grumpy – 6/14/12”

On #5, just incredible that the obscene disparity of wealth is not the driving issue of the upcoming election. We are sliding towards plutocracy, the Republicans have basically become nothing more than lobbyists for the wealthy, most Democrats appear too timid or possibly too comfortable with those same wealthy interests.
The real story and challenge of America is the concentration of wealth, the right has done an excellent job of blaming the poor for our problems but the facts do not support that nonsense. The bottom 40% share 1% of our nations wealth, the top 10% control 80%, and the rest of us (50%) divide the remaining 19%. Which group is most responsible for the state of our economy and society? Which group has the power and influence to affect change?

You hit it on the head – the Democrats are too timid, and in any event, far too conflicted by their own wealthy connections to do anything.

The GOP, as always, played this scheme perfectly. They spent years characterizing any discussion of inequality as “class warfare”. Now the discussion is off the table.

It will get much worse. As the 1% continue to get richer, and buy more influence, not only will our representatives be less likely to take them on, but they will be replaced by others that outright advocate for the 1%.

I hope the discussion of inequality is not yet off the table, I think if more Americans were aware of the actual distribution of wealth they would be outraged. I think it is simply a matter of educating those in the middle, the facts are on our side but the right has blinded so many with a relentless campaign of misinformation and outright lies. Most Americans still cling to the ridiculous notion that the poor are holding us back when the reality it is the rich (and their political enablers) that are the problem.

Education is indeed the key. Unfortunately, the 1% is dismantling that too – see Wisconsin. Billionaires are literally convincing regular people that their fortunes are declining as a result of overpaid teachers.